No. of Recommendations: 19
A couple of things.
The author and I had similar career courses, but he has a *few* (not many) multiples more in wealth than I do
I, too, drove used cars, lived in a used house, brought in bag lunches, and did not typically take expensive vacations.
So: why the difference?
- the first thing that pop out is, apparently, the OP had no kids. We had four, and perhaps I/we overcompensated bc of the gawdawful neighborhood/public school that marked my growing up. It certainly added up: Montessori, first-rate private schools, four years at any university at which they were accepted and chose to attend. Net: four successful, happy, employed, stable adults with (counting) four bachelors', one masters and two doctorates to date. Three live locally, one not that far away. Grandchild(ren). Comparing this scorecard with most of my colleagues kids...there is no comparison.
Cost: probably $350-$400K after-tax for each kid. Times four, average of 15-20 years appreciation on that forfeited principal, historical return of 10%: there's seven or eight of the 'missing' millions right there
- my Day Zero debt was substantially bigger than his.
- he's 4-5 years ahead of me by dates (I became an attending physician in 1992, he in 1988).
- I was v substantially underpaid the first 7-8 years in practice, due to a poorly run practice. I tolerated bc: good group; declining parents nearby; good community to live & raise kids
- ten years of a monthly after-tax check to Mom after Dad passed. The survivor's pension she was left with was only ok, and decades of their own suboptimal financial management left her a widow with a mortgage...in a home she had made into a gardening showplace, and which reminded her of Dad. I wasn't going to make her move to a small place until she was ready.
- it sounds like the OP was very aggressive at tax avoidance. I wasn't. The comments about avoiding Social Security, state income taxes etc wasn't something I was going to do. (I also mistrusted 529s, so the boys' education was out of pocket)
- we did dig down occasionally. Kid vacations are cheap when they're little, but peri-adolescence and high school: eh, not so much. (Read: Hawaii, or one year when they were maybe 8-13, a dude ranch). We had fun. Great food. Great pictures. Great memories. So, I dunno: again counting the time value of twenty years of foregone compounding - maybe half a million?
- I've posted here before about reaching way, way deep for a private jet card when, mid-pandemic, our eldest announced we need to meet his gf bc he anticipated proposing later that year. This when we were all pretty much on lockdown. Anyhow, it was a one-time-only of after-tax cash that would have otherwise quietly grown by the mid- to high- six figures by now
- and finally: I happily retired in my late 50s. Had I not done so and hung in for another decade (and survived to tell the tale) then...say, another eight- or more likely nine-plus million, just by keeping my mitts off the savings, and contributing another $50K or more each year
So that's maybe 16-17 of the 'missing' millions. And, maybe if I got another life after this one, I might have made different choices.
But in this world: nope. It's been and is a great ride, and we have more than what we need.
--sutton
